Like a big playground - the farm down yonder

I had another long weekend...ah, a much needed time off from work.  It's been awhile since I had a good long break...This time a good friend accompanied me to a different place, just after lunch of kebabs, salads and bottles of cold fizzy drinks. Instinctively, we both wanted to avoid the crowd in the city therefore we just took a little drive down the farm nearby after visiting a lake park, photos of which were posted in my last blog...

 As soon as we drove past a farm we saw this horse which, we instantly thought, loved being photographed because as soon as it saw us it immediately ran towards where we stood outside the fence and struck some poses for our cameras, whereas the sheep around it looked afraid and became restless as if wanting to run away from us...

then, we also saw some cows and admired the beautiful sceneries of rolling hills with bales of hay and some alpacas from a distance...what fun! 

A moment's reflection on inner beauty

My favourite place, by the lake...just being here never fails to inspire me....

Begonia Festival -at Ballarat Botanical Gardens

The Begonia Festival is an annual event held at the Ballarat Botanical Gardens, 143 kms northwest of Melbourne...the festival highlights the beauty of the begonias among other activities.
I was so amazed at the beauty of the flowers, and never realized that there could be thousands of varieties of Begonias. Some of them looked like roses as huge as my face! The begonia display/exhibition was held inside the Robert Clarke Conservatory at the botanical gardens which is just across the famous Wendouree Lake.
This post is composed of two albums, one features the beautiful gardens and the other is the begonia display. Hope you'll like this post.

The Robert Clarke Conservatory and Botanical Gardens

there was also a princess mime

wendouree lake, where some of the festive activities were also held

The Begonia Exhibition

The train ride to Ballarat

I was looking forward to the public holiday last Monday, it was labour day. It's been awhile since I've gone to Ballarat, four years to be exact, and with the Begonia Festival being held over the long weekend, I had a good reason to visit the place. Ballarat is 110 kms northwest of Melbourne.
My husband and I decided to take the VLine train which is just an hour-and-a half ride, and on arrival at the station a bus takes the passengers straight to the festival. I was kinda excited going on a day trip especially on such a cool and fine day, what more could I ask for?
I will post the shots taken at the Begonia Fest at a later time. Meanwhile,  here's what kept me awake on the train ride, the country sceneries on the way to Ballarat.
By the way, the quality of the pictures might have been compromised by the fact that I was sitting inside a moving train, but managed to adjust the settings of the camera...and learnt something from a seemingly difficult situation, photography-wise :-))

"The city is the world of the body, the country is the world of the soul..."

a walk on a sunny sunday afternoon

hey hey hey, it's a beautiful day. went for a walk at the botanical gardens in the city with my daughter and a friend.  we walked along the path to the shrine of remembrance which has a magnificent view...

                                        
                                             the tree-lined path to the shrine of remembrance 

the side of the shrine facing the entrance to the botanic gardens

then at the gardens these are the things that we did and saw...

a wedding... there were four weddings that afternoon, actually.

rested under a palm tree beside this garden...

looked at some flowers...this one caught my attention as it's my favourite colour...

i just love the lighting and the contrast in this shot...

admiring the tree that was both unique and HUGE...

and laughed at this braided leaves, tied with a rubber band...

rested for a little while by the shallow river...

and saw this spider web...